The scent of a MetLife Stadium touchdown was in the air for LaDainian Tomlinson.

With the Jets on the Kansas City 19-yard line with 1:23 to play in yesterday’s first half, Tomlinson caught a screen pass from Mark Sanchez. He had never scored a touchdown in MetLife Stadium before.

“As I got closer to the end zone, I could kind of smell it,” Tomlinson said.

Tomlinson said he was simply wishing he didn’t get tackled by anybody, but he didn’t have to worry. He made cornerback Travis Daniels miss, then scampered into the end zone for a 19-yard touchdown en route to the Jets’ 37-10 rout of the Chiefs. In his 13th career game at the Jets’ new home, Tomlinson finally scored his first touchdown.

Tomlinson, third all-time in touchdowns with 162, has now played in 36 different NFL stadiums and reached the end zone in 30 of them. The six exceptions are Seattle’s CenturyLink Field, Philadelphia’s Lincoln Financial Field (where he will play this Sunday against the Eagles), Baltimore’s M&T Bank Stadium, Tampa’s Raymond James Stadium and two defunct stadiums, Texas Stadium (the Cowboys’ old one) and Veterans Stadium (the Eagles’ old one).

Tomlinson had scored in Giants Stadium — he had a four-touchdown performance as a Charger against the Jets on Nov. 6, 2005, which was his last score in East Rutherford until yesterday.

In addition to his milestone, Tomlinson looked impressive, appearing to run swiftly and effectively. He finished with just 14 yards rushing on nine carries but caught two passes for 50 yards. Besides his 19-yard touchdown reception, he had a 31-yard pass play.

Tomlinson saw steady action early before the game got totally out of hand, getting seven carries in the first half (Shonn Greene had 12). Greene finished with 24 carries to Tomlinson’s nine, with coach Rex Ryan saying: “If you have two really good backs, you’re going to use them both.”

After missing two games with an MCL injury, Tomlinson returned last week against the Redskins but only had limited action since he got hurt again.